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HEIGHTS
Originally, Amy Fox's Heights
was a one-act play built around three
characters on a New York rooftop. Now
it has become a tour of Manhattan, compressing
24 hours of day-night-dawn into a 96-minute
motion picture. A funny thing happened
on the way to the screen, and the mutation
is so complete one wonders how it could
ever have been as self-contained as apparently
it once was.
The
invaluable, irreplaceable Ismail Merchant
took an interest in the project, and his
partner, James Ivory, commissioned 25-year-old
Chris Terrio to make his directorial debut
with this expanded adaptation. Merchant,
Ivory, Terrio, and several of the actors
approached to take on newly created roles
offered their ideas and ad libs. Like
Topsy, Heights just grew and
threatened to become giddily topsy-turvy.
Not
to worry. All the strings are pulled together
by a cast able to tie them into a somewhat
illogical but very attractive bow. The
initial trio on the roof has now acquired
threatening pasts and
indeterminate futures.
Elizabeth
Banks plays Isabel, the photographer,
a profession that allows her to roam around
town, from theater auditions to cocktail
parties, while trying to organize her
own impending, highly problematic wedding.
Her mother is a Broadway grande dame about
to tackle Lady Macbeth, and Glenn Close
plays her as a cuckolded casualty in the
closing stages of an open marriage. James
Marsden and Jesse Bradford are Jonathan
and Alec, the two men in the three-way
confrontation that was at the core of
Heights's first incarnation.
They have a lot to hide and seek in this
expanded version.
Marsden
and Bradford propel the twisty plot as
they avoid the scandalous ramifications
of a high-class, art- world gay imbroglio
that involves a Vanity Fair reporter
(the excellent Peter Light from the London
stage) and an ex-lover of the famous,
never-seen master of intrigue. This vague
part is played by pop star Rufus Wainwright,
who would only commit himself to a film
debut if he could share a scene with Glenn
Close.
The
spare playlet is now so densely overpopulated
that it can encourage a game of "Look
who's here" with George Segal, Michael
Murphy, Dennis O'Hare, Isabella Rossellini,
and even columinist Cindy Adams. The whole
construction teeters on the brink of an
oxymoron: deeply superficial.
Yet
even when it's trying to be so desperately
chic, the movie remains witty and smart
enough to classify as sort of "All
About Eve-ish" sophisticated fun.
By focusing so intently on a small sector
of New York life, Heights seductively
suggests that it can only happen here.
Jim Denault's superb cinematography makes
still another character of a wonderful
town where the Bronx is up, the Battery's
down, and anything goes in the middle.
Rene Jordan |
